


10-3, Please...

by womenseemwicked



Series: Playing Card Prompt Challenge [1]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Babysitting, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Fluff and Humor, Harringrove Playing Cards, Humor, M/M, Phone Sex, Post-Canon, Secret Relationship, Walkie-talkie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-05
Updated: 2017-12-05
Packaged: 2019-02-11 03:01:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,404
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12925920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/womenseemwicked/pseuds/womenseemwicked
Summary: Steve is called in to babysit last minute, but the kids don't need much watching.Of course he isn't the type of babysitter to invite his boyfriend over to fuck, but his boyfriend might be.





	10-3, Please...

"Thank you for doing this, Steve. I know it's kind of ruining your night..." Nancy looks lovely with her apologetic smile, but Steve's heart only hurts just a little at the thought that she's dressed for Jonathan now and not for him. He's moved on. They both have.

"No, it's fine. I love watching these kids," Steve assures her with a lazy smile.

"You sure? On the phone it sounded like you were with someone. Someone special?"

Steve shrugs and looks away, hiding a little blush.

"Who is she?" Nancy asks. "Is it serious?"

He tries not to be offended by the relief in Nancy's voice. Like she's been worried all this time that he was just going to pine over her forever.

"It's nothing, Nance," he laughs tightly. "Go meet Jonathan or I won't be the only one missing a date."

"Okay," Nancy agrees with one last apologetic smile, stepping out the front door. "Thanks again, Steve. The boys are in the basement playing their game, so I'd give it a couple hours before you go down. Last time I went in there I nearly got a dice to the head."

Steve chokes on a laugh and nods.

"I'll find a way to occupy myself. Been a while since I hung out with your stuffed animals, anyway," he teases.

"Steve!" but she's laughing as she turns and waves, getting into Jonathan's waiting car.

Steve and Jonathan exchange a nod, and then they're gone.

Ignoring Nancy's advice, Steve makes a beeline for the basement. Just to check in.

"Hey guys, how ya--"

"We're in the middle of a campaign, Steve!" Dustin yells.

"I take the diamond out of my bag of holding and give it to Will," Lucas tells Mike in an urgent nonsequitor.

Steve frowns around at the nightmare mess of a room. Karen and Ted have only been out of town for two days and the Party's basement hangout has already become like something from the Upside Down.

"Steve!" Dustin snaps him out of it.

"What do you want?" Mike asks.

"Just letting you guys know I'm here. Need another wizard or something? I could pick up some... cards... or whatever," Steve tries.

Dustin's pitying smile is enough to tell him he's way off the mark.

"The game is already started, man," Lucas shakes his head. "We'd have to make a whole new character for you."

"And that would take hours," Will agrees.

"The orc army grows restless..." Mike warns the group, returning them to the land of the game.

The other boys are quickly reimmursed in the desperation of their situation, and Steve's presence is forgotten.

He returns upstairs, a little relieved to not be needed in the musky darkness of that room but still more than a little lonely. Nancy was right. Tonight Steve had been planning to have Billy over. He'd been really looking forward to it too. But instead he was here now. "Watching" the boys while Nancy and Jonathan had a night of their own.

He doesn't mean to, but before he knows where his feet are taking him Steve finds himself in Nancy's bedroom. It's weird to enter from the door, he realizes, and weirder still is how different it looks since the last time he snuck in. But Steve hardly has time to admire Jonathan's photographs before a crackle of static from the room next door distracts him.

There's another burst, this time louder, and Steve goes back into the hall.

"Hello?" he calls softly. "Guys?"

Mike's room is empty though. The sound is coming from his unattended walkie talkie.

"Steve, come in. Over."

That's Billy's voice. What the hell?

Steve glances around him and picks up the walkie. He fumbles with the buttons for a moment before hitting the one labeled "talk."

"Billy?" he hisses.

There's a deep, crackled laugh from the other end that, even ruined by static, sends a thrill up Steve's spine.

"You have to hold the button the whole time you talk, loser. And then let it go after, so I can talk back. Over."

"Do I have to say 'over' at the end of every sentence like a dork, too?" Steve teases.

" _You_ might say it like a dork. _I_ say it like someone who knows proper radio communication code. Over."

Steve makes a point to let Billy hear him laugh at that.

"You're so cute when you get defensive, Hargrove," he says. "Over."

"Fuck you. Over."

Steve smiles.

"I wish," he agrees. "Instead of sitting around next door to my ex's bedroom while the kids yell at each other about wizard hats and quick sand pits downstairs without me."

That sounds more miserable than flirty. Shit.

"Aww are your little friends excluding you? Over." He can hear the smirk in Billy's voice, but it's not meanspirited.

"Least it means they've abandoned their radios," Steve points out. "Although I'm not convinced this is better than a phone conversation. You have heard of telephones in that wolf's den you live in, haven't you?"

"Papa wolf would rip this cub apart if he picked up the other line and heard any given sentence of the filth that comes out of your pretty mouth, Harrington," Billy replies quickly. "Trust me. This is better. Over."

"What about Max?" Steve worries. "Isn't she gonna come looking for her thing? Over?"

"Sleepover with the Police chief's new kid. Elle or whatever." Steve might be imagining it, but he thinks he can hear the rustling of sheets as Billy settles more comfortably. "We've got the air waves to ourselves tonight, babe. Over."

Steve can't help but snort.

"We're gonna do this aren't we? Jesus, Bill. You really will get it on anywhere, won't you? Even over radio waves. I feel like we need codenames for this. Over."

"First you abandon me to go watch your kids, then you make fun of my recovery plan? You really are a shit boyfriend, babe. Oh and our codenames are _King_ and _Princess_. I think you can figure out who's who. Over."

"You're shitting me," Steve laughs. "You want me to call you  _Princess_?"

"Of course I'm shitting you," Billy snorts. "But if those _were_ our codenames _I'd_ be _King_. Obviously. Over."

"Wait what? Since when?"

"Since I dethroned you at that Halloween party, _Princess_ , keep up. Over."

Steve groans.

"Okay well can I at least be _Queen?_ I don't like the relationship implications of being _Princess_ to your _King_ , Bill. Really limits the things I can do to you with my mouth. Over."

"Not a chance. Then any time I said your name I'd be thinking about Freddie Mercury. Shoot me but I'd rather have _you_. Over."

"You're so romantic. I guess _Prince_ is out then too, huh?" Steve smirks.

"Absolutely. Face it  _Princess_ , the name fits. Over."

Steve thinks for a moment. Perhaps Princess isn't so bad...

"You know code names are useless when we just heard you decide what your code names were gonna be, right?" Lucas's cynical voice crackles over the speaker so clearly Steve nearly drops the walkie.

"And we know your voices," Will agrees, speaking from farther away from the walkie they must have downstairs.

Silence reigns.

Steve's face must be burning.

"Oh and congratulations, guys, you sound happy." That's Dustin. He sounds just about as mortified as Steve feels, but somehow genuinely not disgusted or pissed off. Steve beams.

"We aren't gonna be done with this campaign for a few hours, anyway so uh... Billy... if you wanna come over--" Mike is cut off by arguing and the walkie going silent as the other kids take it from him. Steve's heart is in his throat as he waits for it go make sound again. Finally it does.

"As long as you promise not to beat anyone up," Mike clarifies. "You can... come over if you want, Billy. We'll make lots of noise when we're coming upstairs."

"Just, for the love of god leave our radios out of this, y'all _Kings_. Okay?" Lucas gets on again.

"Yes sir. Jesus. Sorry, guys," Steve grits his teeth. And then after a thought: "over and out."

"Now you _do_ sound like a dork, Harrington," Billy's voice laughs even through the awkwardness. "Any self respecting radio user knows it's just 'Out.' And yeah, sorry guys. Return to your quest and uh... I'll take you up on those loud noises. Steve, I'll see you in a bit, babe. Out."

**Author's Note:**

> 10-3 is Indiana Police radio code for "Stop Transmitting."
> 
> This was written for week one of flippyspoon's Playing Card Prompt Challenge on Tumblr. I got the Nine of Clubs (Genre: Humor, and Object: Ray Ban's or a Walkie-Talkie), a Three (Third character: Nancy), and another Nine (Location: the Wheelers's house).  
> I may have thrown in more characters than just Nancy, which I'm pretty sure in retrospect we weren't really supposed to do (whoops!) but I promise I'll make up for it later. ;)


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